The Minister of Culture Roselyne Bachelot announced Thursday that the summer festivals could be held, on condition of limiting their gauges to 5,000 seated people, pending a favorable development in the health situation.

Some festivals have already made decisions regarding their maintenance or cancellation.

DECRYPTION

After the announcements on February 18 of a possibility of maintaining summer festivals, but with a gauge of 5,000 people seated and distanced, the reactions of cultural professionals were linked this weekend.

Some festivals welcome government decisions.

Despite the establishment of test concerts, others have instead decided to throw in the towel.

Hellfest and Garorock give up, while Francofolies and Vieilles Charrues are optimistic.

Europe 1 takes stock of those that are maintained and those that are postponed, in order of announcements.

Hellfest postponed to 2022 ...

Festivals with international programming are the first to throw in the towel.

"A cancellation of Hellfest seems inevitable," Ben Barbaud told AFP on Friday morning, boss of this festival specializing in metal organized in Clisson in Loire-Atlantique (180,000 spectators in 2019).

The official decision fell in the afternoon: the festival is postponed to 2022. "Imagining a Hellfest with 5,000 festival-goers drawn at random from the 60,000 already provided with a 3-day pass, seated and distanced is fanciful at best, but no longer really a heresy, "wrote the event in a statement posted on its site.

Hellfest offers spectators the option of keeping their 3-day or 1-day pass purchased in 2020, which will be valid for the 2022 edition, to be held on June 17, 18 and 19, 2022.

... while Garorock and Solidays are canceled

The Garorock festival (162,000 people in 2019, in Lot-et-Garonne) announced on Friday February 19 its outright cancellation, and not its postponement.

"Our configuration (50,000 festival-goers per day, 40,000 campers) does not allow us to comply with the new standards required (a seated audience of 5,000 festival-goers at most). We cannot distort the Garorock Experience. "

The organizer has already opened the reimbursement of tickets. 

>> READ ALSO - In Saint-Malo, a test-concert project in the open air ... and standing up!

Solidays (228,000 spectators in 2019 in the Paris region) became on February 10 the first of the major French summer music festivals to announce its cancellation, like major events abroad such as Glastonbury in England or Coachella in the States -United.

A televised evening would be in preparation.

The Francofolies maintained

The measures announced by the Minister of Culture satisfied Gérard Pont, president of the Francofolies de La Rochelle (July 10 to 14).

In a statement released Friday evening, the festival, whose programming is not international, confirmed its maintenance, adding that "tickets already purchased and not having been refunded remain valid for this summer" .

10 days of Old Plows

Les Vieilles Charrues (270,000 spectators in Brittany) have reinvented themselves, announcing "10 evenings of concerts, from July 8 to 18" instead of the four days initially planned, to comply with the new rules.

On Europe 1 Friday, the director Jérôme Trehorel said that "we will be more on evening formats of concerts with two to three artists per evening".

>> READ ALSO - Unique scene, chairs, more than 4 days: what will the Vieilles Charrues 2021 look like?

However, this special 2021 edition will have a special ticket office, set up in the spring.

"Tickets purchased for the 2020 edition will not be valid for the 10 Vieilles Charrues evenings. You can request reimbursement for weekend tickets (Friday, Saturday and Sunday) as well as 3-day passes using a form on our website, www .vieillescharrues .asso .fr. All details will be available on February 25, on the festival's website ", the festival specifies on its website. 

The pending festivals 

The Eurockéennes (128,000 people in 2019 in Belfort) have not yet made a decision, but their teeth are grinding.

"We are in shock, our backs to the wall," said Thursday to AFP Jean-Paul Roland, director of the festival and representative of Prodiss (National Union of producers, broadcasters, festivals and theaters in the private sector).

"At the Eurocks, the spectator is not there to sit and see a concert. He is there for a moment of life. This is what is excluded with the decision of the ministry", regrets Jean-Paul Roland.

All eyes are now on the Ile-de-France festival We Love Green (80,000 spectators in 2019) scheduled for June. "We Love Green surveyed its festival-goers: the answers are clear, 85% of those surveyed said that they would not come if it was a seated festival", already slips Jean-Paul Roland. The Musilac festival has not yet pronounced itself but its creator Rémi Perrier spoke on February 18 on franceinfo: "The standing version, I feel it strongly compromised and that would be an explosion". The Printemps de Bourges, at the beginning of May (200,000 people in 2019), had already anticipated and put an end to its largest enclosure of 10,000 people.